Some of the same songs off Embrace The Eternal and some other songs, the sound is more American Death Metal than Embrace, faster and more evil sounding. Definitely glad I looked these up its been a while since I've listened to Embodyment.
This is the first interview I've done, some of the questions are poorly worded but Dan was kind enough to answer them anyway, hope to get better as I do more interviews.
You guys released Age Of Ignorance this year, how's the response been? Are there any
aspects of the record you really dislike? Favorite song to play live?
People have been pretty into it. It's kind of a more mature Perverted Justice. I think it's a solid release, by far my favorite record we've done. Arm's Length and 360 Disease are my favorites to do live, AL cause it has some hard vocal parts and I like the challenge, 360 cause I can mosh during the intro.
Did Triple B Records approach you guys about doing a 7", how did this relationship start?
Well Sam hit us up a long time ago about it. We'd committed to doing the Creatures split and then started working on the Triple-B 7". It took us a while, but we finally got the record finished for him. Sam has always been really good to us, he's the nicest dude and he's always stood by us. His label is killing it right now.
From what I've gathered Downpresser has been a band for a while now and has only recently
started to heavily tour. I feel like the slower approach helped nurture a much more mature sound, tell me about the history of Downpresser.
Sean and Jim started jamming together in late '05. Russ got in the mix and they asked me to sing. We started practicing heavily in early '06 and released our demo later that year. We played under a couple shitty names and didn't really take the band seriously, it was more for fun. People started to take notice in and around our area and we developed a modest following. We changed our name to Downpresser and recorded Perverted Justice. Nobody knew what it would be, a 7" or another demo or what, we just recorded it. Todd Jones got a hold of it and told us he wanted to release it as a one-sided 12". That blew my mind. Honestly there is no way we'd still be a band if it weren't for Todd. We owe him a lot, not only for the record, he promoted us by word of mouth to people all over the country and got us on some cool weekend tours in Cali. After that things just kinda started coming together, and we've had a couple second guitar players but it's always been the same solid four people so far which I think definitely has benefited our sound and style.
Having Sound And Fury in your backyard has exposed a lot more people to the band I actually heard you guys just before the 08 S&F and saw you for the first time there. What are your
thoughts on the Fest? Thoughts on the way it saturates the Southwest around the Fest.
It's always a problem after S&F for shows. This year we played the Monday after with like Iron Age, Mammoth Grinder, and Power Trip at Chain Reaction and the show was a bust. Everyone gets burnt which is a drag but fuck, I don't know how to fix it. After a fest like that, I'm tired, but I'm always super amped on hardcore in general. S&F is awesome, Bob Todd and Riley are all cool dudes and they don't care what people think as far as the fest. Like they don't buy into the idea that certain bands should or shouldn't be playing based on their popularity, they just do their thing, and it's always been a really diverse and fun show because of that.
I liked going to The Alpine from Arizona for bigger shows, what happened to it?
It just fell apart. I guess having a hair salon and laundromat in a venue was a bad business plan, who would have thought...
Most of your lyrics deal with moral decay, humanities undoing, slave state, political corruption, A reoccurring theme to me is your disgust with success through the oppression of others
(It's fair to say that I don't have what it takes Cause I can't fuck someone over and not lie awake & You can feast if you eat like a cannibal)
Does just living by certain principles keep you young, keep a purpose for you? Progression through discontent? What is something you've been trying to get across lyrically that has gone unnoticed in your eyes?
Now this is tough. Cause I do see lots of fucked up shit going on, but in lots of ways I'm not leading by example. I do have certain principles that I live by, although many people wouldn't consider them that. A lot of my lyrics also deal with personal responsibility. Like I notice fucked up shit going on around me, and I write about it, but I also write about my own shortcomings. Too many hardcore frontmen write lyrics like they're the perfect example of the way to be, and nothing is their fault, when that's actually not the case most of the time.
Favorite cities to play?
Santa Barbara, Chula Vista, Long Island, Ft. Worth.
Thoughts on Tucson and Arizona? Be honest.
Tucson is pretty hit or miss. Like the good shows we've had there have been amazing, like 4th of July last summer. We've had some fun at the Living Room too. But yeah we've had some shows with 30 kids sitting outside the venue chit chatting while touring bands are inside playing. And I mean, no offense, but AZ isn't exactly a hotbed for hardcore, and in smaller scenes it's really dangerous to be so cavalier with your shows like that. Be thankful for what you have, right? But yeah I feel as a whole AZ is cool, we've made lots of good friends there.
Favorite records of 2009?
Fuck. Backtrack, Power Trip, TUI, Forfeit... They all have solid records out in '09. That Fire & Ice joint is insanely good.
Plans for 2010?
Write a full-length for fall, tour in summer probably. Pretty standard.
